Few people anticipated the roller-coaster ride that was 2020 – not only did the pandemic wreck havoc on many companies and industries but it also forced other sectors to close shop for more than one and a half years. 2021, however, has been the year of resurrection as firms across the globe have started to recuperate from the pandemic effect. This resurrection effort has been led by India, which welcomed the newest addition to the unicorn family in the form of edtech start-up upGrad on Monday.
The six-year-old upGrad became the latest firm to evolve into a unicorn after it closed a $185-million funding round which included participation from Singapore’s Temasek Holdings Ltd, the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation (IFC), and IIFL. The latest funding round took its valuation to $1.2 billion, marking the 21st Indian unicorn this year.
Founded by Ronnie Screwvala, Mayank Kumar, Phalgun Kompalli, and Ravijot Chugh, the edtech start-up is known for offering higher education courses on streams like data science, machine learning, artificial intelligence, blockchain, finance, programming, and law in collaboration with various universities such as Michigan State University, IIT Madras and IIT Delhi, Deakin Business School, Liverpool John Moores University, Swiss School of Business Management, Geneva, and others. It claims to have a million users globally, a big chunk of which consists of paid learners.
upGrad has taken full advantage of the ongoing golden age of the Indian start-up ecosystem. The start-up had raised $120 million from Temasek in April (at a valuation of nearly $600 million) and acquired upskilling platform KnowledgeHut earlier this month.
Ronnie Screwvala, co-founder and chairperson of upGrad, said that the firm is very focused on its path to numbering among the top 3-5 companies globally in the edtech sector and serving the 1 billion workforce across the age group of 18 to 60 years. “We are pleased with the investor interest ever since we opened up for fundraise, and had our maiden raise from Temasek, followed by IFC and IIFL in the last 60 days,” he said, adding that they would announce further updates on M&As, and unlock value as they unfold.
upGrad also became the third edtech start-up to become a unicorn, after Byju’s and Unacademy. However, the road ahead is super tough, especially since competitors have also been growing at a massive pace, making acquisitions and raising billions of dollars in capital. Nonetheless, today is a big day for upGrad, which plans to use these capitals for new mergers and acquisitions, much like its competitors.
